The beauty of Józsefváros’ placemaking approach lies in its ability to drive district-wide transformation from the ground up. With a “learning by doing” mindset, the municipality continues to pilot ideas, refine them, and integrate successful interventions into regulations and investment frameworks.
The district’s vision is clear: to build more accessible, community-driven, and people-first neighborhoods. By taking short-term actions now, Józsefváros is shaping long-term change for future generations. This strategic evolution showcases the district’s commitment to placemaking as a transformative force—creating spaces that aren’t just used, but loved.
Where the Experimental Ideas rise
The 8th district of Budapest is a large, high-density central area known for its dynamic mix of social and spatial diversity. While this offers both unique challenges and exciting opportunities, Józseváros has taken them head-on, transitioning from separate projects to a more integrated and systemic approach. By participating in the Cities in Placemaking programme, the municipality has broadened its strategies integrating lessons from the programme into its daily practice.
From Projects to Method
The district’s journey began with a focus on experimentation. The city quickly saw the potential of temporary interventions as powerful tools for testing what works — e.g. tactical junctions, an open street, parklets, and further pilot projects. These small-scale efforts were not just quick fixes but stepping stones to lasting urban change. Introducing parklet regulations, for example, streamlined the process for citizens to transform public spaces for community use, creating an accessible avenue for innovation.
The question now is how to shift these temporary interventions from experiments into permanent features of the city’s urban fabric. To make this leap, Józsefváros is working to change mindsets fostering the idea that tactical urbanism can be a legitimate and lasting urban strategy, rather than just a placeholder for future development.
The Cities in Placemaking programme has provided Józsefváros with valuable lessons. Key takeaways from this journey include:
- From temporary interventions → To a structured system of testing and scaling up
- From top-down planning → To prioritising community-led initiatives
- From isolated projects → To placemaking as a method embedded in city governance
- From trial-and-error → To a data-driven, monitored process
This shift has allowed Józsefváros to integrate placemaking into the city’s broader strategic agenda where it is a core principle. Additionally, by improving its monitoring and assessment processes, the district can now detect and address challenges early, ensuring interventions are continuously refined.
What’s Next for Józsefváros: Scaling Up and Broadening Impact
Looking ahead, Józsefváros is ready to take placemaking to the next level. The city’s next steps are bold testing interventions on a larger scale and expanding placemaking efforts into more complex urban areas, like major construction projects and boulevards. Key priorities moving forward include:
- Expanding monitoring to better understand the long-term effects of placemaking and to inform future projects.
- Further increasing inclusivity by reaching a broader, more diverse group of participants.
- Strengthening maintenance efforts, acknowledging that successful urban transformation involves both creating and sustaining vibrant spaces.
- Fostering community-led processes, ensuring public spaces reflect deeper on the needs and desires of the people who use them.
A major challenge will be overcoming the “Cool, but not here” mentality, where innovative ideas are welcomed in theory but face resistance when applied to specific areas. Józsefváros plans to address this by expanding trust with citizens even further – using data, storytelling, and visible, well-communicated changes to demonstrate the value of placemaking initiatives.
A Vision of Shared Value
Józsefváros, a municipality having continuously explored participation in recent years, aims to expand even further by transforming the resident – municipality relationship into a trusted experience. The district’s continued success will depend on value-based collaborations—working in networks and providing opportunities to local actors through open calls. By fostering a culture of care, nurturing relationships, and integrating social values into every project, Józsefváros’s placemaking journey demonstrates how local action, when coupled with a systemic agenda, can drive a transformation that is sustainable, inclusive, and deeply rooted in the community.
Written by: Marta Popiolek
Credits to the Józsefváros, the 8th district of Budapest Team:
- Lilla Gerencsér
- Dániel Győrfi
- András Hajdú
- Viktória Kocsis
- Anna Nagyunyomi-Sényi
- Dániel Rádai
- Lonci Tóbiás
